It’s no secret that Pasadena isn’t quite flush with Jews. That might be related to the fact that the Hebrews were banned from living in the place until more recent times, but who can really know. What is know, though, is that without Jews there is a certain lack of amenities like good bagels and Jewish delis. Fortunately, the Pasadena Sandwich Company is there to at list fill part of the niche of the Jewish deli.
The Palm Springs area isn’t exactly known for its culinary prowess. You see, septuagenarians don’t really care how their food tastes as long as they can be done with dinner by 6:00. Nonetheless, there are a few places willing to take some risks and offer unique eats (even if they do sport an early bird special to boot). One of these is Catalan in Rancho Mirage, a Mediterranean restaurant in the sense of the European parts of the Mediterranean at least.
What’s the craziest thing you’ve ever done while drunk? Broken a bone? Slept with an unsavory character? Got a tattoo? How about changing your frigging name to Bacon Double Cheeseburger? No? Well a British man formerly known as Sam Smith did just that. Of course, when compared to a name like Metta World Peace, Bacon Double Cheeseburger almost seems like the most sane name in the world.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: when it comes to Italian food (namely pasta), you’ve gotta be pretty damn special to convince me I can’t do better on my own at home with the dry stuff and some Classico sauce. Union Restaurant in Old Town Pasadena is the latest attempt to convince me to leave home for Italian food.
Yard House is one of those places that, before entering, you can’t decide if you want to love or hate. On one hand, it has one of the biggest beer selections a bar can possibly have and bar food to go with it. On the other hand, it’s more than a little bro-ish. Yet, the first hand was the dominant hand and I entered the LA Live location hoping for the best.
In Los Angeles, there are supposedly really only two breakfast burritos. One is at the Corner Cottage in Burbank and the other is at either of the two Lucky Boy locations in Pasadena. I visited the newer location on Walnut Street and vowed to take down the “Famous” burrito (it’s literally the name of the burrito).
What’s in a name? A xiaolongbao by any other name would be just as soupy. Well, at least that’s what Long Xing Ji is banking on. You see, Long Xing Ji was once called Wang Xing Ji and was an incredibly popular dumpling spot in San Gabriel. Typically a wildly successful place would stick with a name that works, but for some reason that was not the case with Wang Xing Ji. Nonetheless, if the dumplings were as good as I had heard, I wasn’t going to complain about the name.
It’s not the most creative thing to name a restaurant after the street it resides on. It’s slightly more creative to name a restaurant after a distant street and the experience that the restaurant is trying to recreate. However, there are very few places that dare to be named for a street that’s right nearby, but not actually running by the place. Such is the case for Green Street in Pasadena, which happens to be on Shoppers Lane. Apparently Shoppers Lane just didn’t have the same ring.
Pork and booze are easily two of the greatest things that can be consumed on the planet, if not just two of the greatest things in general. Celestino in Pasadena is fully aware of this and has combined them in a pasta dish worth writing about. It is called the Pennette Con Prosciutto e Vodka, but it may as well be called Paradiso.
South Pasadena is a unique place. As a wholly independent city, it’s often thought of as a more hoity toity part of the area. Yet, it retains a charm that is distinctly “main street.” The part of Fair Oaks that runs through town features a pharmacy straight out of a Norman Rockwell painting, but more importantly it has Gus’s Bar-B-Q, which has been around since 1946.